#ThrowBackToday: Reminiscing the poetic side of Sarojini Naidu on her death anniversary today

We are all well acquainted with the political activist Sarojini Naidu, the Nightingale of India who left for the heaven above on March 2, 1949. But do we know her as a poet? Born to the principal of Nizam's College in Hyderabad, she received a scholarship at the age of 16 from the Nizam himself to study at King’s College in London. She rubbed shoulders with Nobel laureates there who advised her to stick to Indian themes that come naturally to her. She was a poet extraordinaire and her works like The Palanquin Bearers, The Bird of Time⁠ and many more continue to feature in our textbooks. A few lines from her poems -

The Palanquin Bearers
Lightly, O lightly we glide and we sing,
We bear her along like a pearl on a string.

The Bird of Time
O Bird of Time on your fruitful bough
What are the songs you sing?...
Songs of the glory and gladness of life,
Of poignant sorrow and passionate strife...

Who's the king?
It's a tale as old as time — a film crew helmed by an ambitious director lands on a desolate island. The actor is new and naive but develops a unique bond with King Kong, the ape who reigns over the land. Sounds familiar? This tale first played out on the big screens of New York on March 2, 1933 and slowly, it made its way all over the world.